The Mechanic
by buttscuzyolo
Summary: When Pip went on the Hovercraft, just looking to do her job as Shiled's only Mechanic and fix a few planes, she didn't expect much. What she got was adventure, new friends, fun, danger, and mommy problems. She was out of her leage. Rated T for language. No romance. Possibility of a second book. Please R&R. Please read the Author's note at the end. Thank you!
1. Chapter 1

"Hurry up! I got a mission in 5."

'Maybe if you stopped breaking all your stuff I wouldn't have to hurry up.' Was my I-dare-not-say-it-out-loud thought. This young Agent had been down here more times than I care to remember, which honestly wasn't that many.

Mechanics don't get much respect, so I kept my mouth shut and did what he told me to.

"Here."

"Finally!" He grabbed his stuff and rushed out of my office, slamming my creaky door as he did.

I say office, I mean basement where people drop off their broken supplies and fixed them. It was actually pretty big, as it was the entire basement save for bathrooms.

I had a desk, though. Positioned in the middle of the basement between two support beams. For paperwork, which I luckily didn't have to do much of.

My favorite part was my working desk. Which took up an entire wall, it was where I worked on long term stuff as well as a few personal projects no one cared enough to question. Tools scattered all along it.

An old broken car sat in the back of the basement, from someone very important to me, that I enjoyed tinkering with from time to time.

I went back to messing with whatever the most important Agent on my list broke while daydreaming.

Not much entertainment or guest down in the basement, unless they were here to yell at me or make me fix not even broken tools. Besides my radio on my desk playing some 80s to now station, to the left of me. Worst part of important Agents, they wanted me to write down everything I did to their gear. So I had to sit at my paperwork desk while fixing their stuff. It's my least favorite desk. The chair is nice, though.

You would be surprised of the things people brought for me to fix. For Agents of a secret organization, they could be surprisingly dense. I kept a log of the funniest/worst items brought to me. It was very long. The top of the list was a knife. Just a plain knife. Literally nothing special about it.

So I sat thinking while humming to some tune I probably didn't know well enough to actually be humming and writing down literally everything I did. It was a way to spite the Agents who made me do this.

With a creak the door to my office swung open and in walked Agent Maria Hills. Technically she was my boss. She's very good at being a boss. She's probably why anything gets down, besides the occasional walk throughs Director Fury does.

Agent Hills held a large cardboard box filled with things I knew close to nothing about.

"Here's stuff from the lab, fixed by tomorrow." She dropped the large box in front of me and walked off towards the door, after a looking around my office with a disdainful glare. I don't think she liked it as much as I did. It might have been the smell. It was probably the smell.

"Yes ma'am." Came my unenthusiastic reply to the Agent already halfway through the door.

Lab stuff always took way longer. As I said I knew almost nothing about any of this stuff.

I'm a mechanic, not a scientist.

At least some of the scientist were nice enough to leave whatever manuals they had as well as personal recordings of what the thing did.

I got to work.

Finishing work for the day was a big load of my shoulders. This week had been really heavy, due to the Tesseract being newly in our possession. It sucked, and broke everything. It probably did it just to spite me. In fact, the only reason I knew we had the Tesseract was because Agents have to tell me why their stuff broke.

As I unlocked the door to my very small and dingy apartment my labrador dog began to bark and dance around excitedly.

"Shh, please. Linda will kill me ,Jackson, please." The apartment owners association leader, which wasn't even a real thing, Linda, didn't like how loud my dog was. He's a dog, what can I do but shush him and hope?

He quieted down, then looked at me with his chocolate brown eyes that basically screamed feed me. So I did. I got him some water, too, but he focused on the food. Jackson was a good dog.

I liked the simplicity of my life, I had my tools and my dog. As well as a few random people. The library worker on Saturdays, my next door neighbor, the old lady from the bakery down the street. Those were my kind of people.

I turned the t.v on to some random news channel and got out some sort of left overs.

Yep, the glamorose secret organization life!

It wasn't nearly as entertaining as one would think. For every Field Agent there were three to five non active Agents. You had to have something you liked to do, hobbies.

I liked to read.

Anything, I guess. Nonfiction, but mostly fiction. Science fiction was a favorite of mine.

An entire world created for me to explore, it's a wonderful thing. To be that talented, to be able to create entire world, that was truly a gift from the Gods.

Trips to the library were a sort of tradition for me. I get up Saturday morning, go to the library, look through all the books, pick one, read through some of it, check it out, come back home around dinner.

I recently picked up some classic Sherlock Holmes adventures, so it was interesting going through those and comparing them to the Sherlock we see on t.v shows and movie today.

I got halfway through when Jackson decided to join me, warming my left side from the cold air of my dingy apartment.

Halfway through the book, and all the way through dinner, I put the book down and picked up my journal.

When one works for a secret organization, one should keep a log of everything one does, along with evidence and proof, just in case. Some blackmail and company secrets couldn't hurt, too.

I went through everything I did, glancing at the notes I took during work to make sure I had the times right as well. This was probably one of my favorite thing to do, sadly enough. It made me feel like I did a lot. That's a good feeling.

When I finished and glanced at the clock, it was sometime around 11, which meant it was time for bed. I get tired easily so I really need my sleep. I also just really like sleeping.

So I went to bed, ready to do it all over again tomorrow. Well, sort of.

Tomorrow I get transferred to the Hovercraft to work on the planes.

I liked working on the planes, they were closer to the cars I started out with. Something was broken, so I fixed it. That simple. No super plasma beam with something shiny attached to it. And I got to play around in really high tech planes. Who doesn't like that?

I also got more free time on the Hovercraft, leaving me free to daydream, something tended to do a lot.

" _Pip, Pip, Pip!" I shook to attention and glanced up at mom._

" _Sorry." She shook her head._

" _How are you going to be a great Shield Agent if you keep daydreaming and saying 'sorry'? Focus!" I frowned, but finished whatever it was she wanted me to do. Something to do with exercise, my least favorite thing to do."Very good, next."_

 _This is why I liked spending time with grandma more. She just made me eat cookies and other foods._

 _Eventually mom had to leave for training, but she told me to stay directly where I was. Under no circumstances was I to move._

 _But then I saw a man in grease stained jeans and a plain shirt. So naturally I went over to him. He was standing in front of an old looking car, a beautiful red color._

" _What are you doing?" The man stood up in shock, banging his head on the top of the engine's hood. Grumbling to himself, he turned towards me, but soon relaxed._

" _Hey kid, just fixing an old car."_

" _Pip." I corrected. He smiled at me._

" _Torin." I smiled at him._

" _Why? Why fix it? Why not just get a new one?" He smiled, remembering something._

" _Because it's your stuff. You gotta keep your stuff. 'Cause there's only so many things you can call your own."_

 _I nodded and listened carefully as he began explaining exactly what he was doing as he did it. I loved it. It was simply cause and effect. I touch this, this happens. Torin even let me help with the engine of his beloved car. Although he cringed every time I did something._

 _When mom finally found me with the mechanic she freaked out. I wasn't allowed back to the Shield base for a week._

 _That didn't matter, though. I finally found_ _something I liked doing._ _And that's more important than whatever lesson mom was trying to teach me._


	2. Chapter 2

I had to get up early to get to the Hovercraft on time. I hate getting up early. The blaring of the alarm, the dark pre-sunrise of the sky, the slugness of my entire body.

Jackson hates it too. He was coming with me, as I was going to be on the Hovercraft for some amount of months. Could be one, could be six. They never seem to specify. He let out whine after whine hoping to slow me down. It did, but not for very long.

"Come on boy, we gotta go." I clipped his dark brown leash onto his dark brown collar, which happened to match his dark brown fur. Jackson was a simple dog, a labrador if I'd ever seen one. And I had seen a few, I grew up with dogs, my grandma's. Loyal to a fault, loving to the point of annoying, trustworthy to the point of reliability.

I grabbed my large dark brown rolling luggage bag and a dark brown backpack filled with personal notebooks, a laptop, changers, stuff for Jackson, random tools, and on and on.

I'm going for a dark brown theme, not intentionally. It just happened to be the cheapest color most of the time. I really didn't make that much money. It was surprising how badly Shield treated it's only mechanic. I don't even have any health benefits.

But who was I to complain. I liked the work and didn't really mind the treatment. And, since I'm technically an Agent of Shield, I get a raise every year I survive, 4 down hopefully the rest of my life to go. I began my work as a mechanic when I was 16, as I was born into this life and had a mentor, so my pay is higher than my mentor's was at my current age.

I walked the distance to the 'phone company' I worked at, Shield's cover. It wasn't the headquarters, or even close, the people at the headquarters just sent Agent Hills by with their broken stuff, preferring not to have a mechanic stinking up their clean building. Which worked for me, I didn't really like the large clean headquarters anyway. I was let in by the secretary, a nice young lady by the name of Emily. We got along fine, but I don't think she really liked me all that much.

Going through the halls I noticed a lot of tired Agents ready to go to sleep, having been stuck with the night shift. I saw the occasional early riser, but only a few. Almost no one at Shield wasted what little sleep they get so they could see the sunrise. In the beginning, sure. But after a while it gets less and less desirable.

I eventually made it to the loading dock and waited for my turn. The loading dock is really just a small field behind the building where we landed the planes. Today the, surprisingly small amount of, Agents chosen to go to the Hovercraft from our building were all loading on a reasonably sized plane to get there. Me included.

I got a few dirty looks for having Jackson with me, who was peeing on the side of the walkway and definitely not helping his cause, but I wasn't going to stand down and leave my dog at home. I may be a bundle of nerves and social anxiety, but this I could stand strong for. This I could fight for.

Eventually we all got on and went to our assigned seats, me being placed in the back with Jackson as my seat buddy. It was for the best, honesty. I didn't really know anybody else there, or care to.

Jackson went to sleep immediately, a skill I was incredibly jealous of, while I was doomed to not being able to get a wink of sleep. The ride would only last a few hours, but a few hours on a plane bored out of my mind would feel a lot longer.

So I got out my Sherlock Holmes book and began reading about wonderful adventures with Doctor Watson and the man himself. It really was a fun read and an amazing world to explore.

I read for most of the flight, but then my eyes began to droop and my mind began to wander. So I got out my earbuds and tuned into the 80s to now radio station from my phone and relaxed into my uncomfortable seat.

And slowly...fell...asleep.

Shouts of 'let's go!' or 'hurry it up' woke my sleeping form, and Jackson's.

Neither of us were really that happy to be woken up, but opened our eyes to a bright sun none the less. This was gonna suck.

I get sea sick, the Hovercraft spends a noticeable amount of time in the sea. Where it happened to be at this very moment. I could feel it already. I knew it was mental, I knew it was ridiculous. That didn't stop my body from tensing up and my face from turning green.

I hate this part. I've been on the Hovercraft before, at total of twice before today, and transitioning on to it is always the worst part. But I have to do it at some point and it was time to man up.

So I grab Jackson's leash, which had been on the entire ride due to prior complaints, replace the brown backpack on my back, and grab my large luggage bag.

I wait in the line of Agents, eager to get off of the plane that held their got-to-move forms captive for so long. Meanwhile I rubbed the sleep from my eyes and looked lovingly back at my chair, which held me in a deep sleep for too short amount of time.

None the less I was filed out of the plane and glared at the bright sky. Who gave it permission to be such a dick?

"Pip, had a nice trip, I assume?" Oh wonderful. They would send my mom to lead me to my room, basically a closet inside the lab. I already know where it is, she probably volunteered. I look towards her and smile a tense smile, that just so happened to match hers.

"Of course. How's life been?" I ask her in what could have been considered a sarcastic tone while looking her up and down. I haven't seen my mother in months. Somehow she looks younger.

Long blonde hair and brown eyes that contradicted my short, boyishly styled, unnaturally red hair and green eyes. A slim fit body contradicted my normal surprisingly weak one. And a nice, expensive, tailor made suit contradicted my graphic tee and jeans. Maybe you can tell why there's so much tension is so few words.

"Wondeful. I see you brought Jackson." I frowned. Mom didn't like dogs, part of the reason I like going to Grandma's so much was for the dogs, and the food, and the company, and the rest of it all.

"Lead the way." I responded faking cheerfulness, not daring to go down that road of whether or not Jackson should be with me. It only leads to fights and screaming.

And so she did. Down the hundreds of halls, thousands of rooms, things that probably shouldn't exist, into the lab and then finally into my closet.

It wasn't really a closet. It was a bit smaller than the lab, which was pretty big, with the same kind of working desk, paperwork desk, and multiple tool boxes spread about the room as my normal office. As well as paperwork ready to be done on my desk. The only problem was the single bulb on a string hanging over my desk. It was incredibly creepy. And the smell. It smelled really weird in here.

"Work had been good, I assume." I sighed, giving up on conversation with my mother.

"I'm not doing this right now, mom. I just got of a flight. I'll visit you later and we can talk all you want then."My mom didn't look very happy, but then I let Jackson off his leash so he could run around the room. She decided to clear out pretty quickly.

"Fine. Later." With a creak of the door she left. I grumbled a bit, this door creaked to. Was a non creaky door too much to ask for? I decided to ignore this for now, seeing as if I asked them to fix it they would send me to do it and I hate fixing creaky doors.

I put my luggage down and unzipped it, opening it up and grabbing the two small lamps from inside. I can't work in this dark of a space, I learned that from my first trip onto the Hovercraft.

I placed them both behind my paperwork desk, on the left corner and the right corner of my working desk against the grey back wall. Everything seemed to be grey in any Shield base. Director Fury's favorite color must be grey.

Jackson's whine caught my attention. He was on the twin sized bed smushed against the left wall. Yes, they wanted me to sleep in the same room I worked. A dark and smelly room. As I said, they don't really take care of their only mechanic.

Sure they had a team of people building their cars and planes and weapons and tools, but only one person to fix them. It was strange, to say the least. To be fair, they didn't treat the team of builders very nicely either. It's something we all bond over.

A second whine had me coming over to Jackson. I took off his collar and scratched his head.

"Sorry buddy, not much here." He whined once more in agreement. I took off my backpack and started taking everything out. Laptop and charger on the paperwork desk, Jackson's food and toys at the foot at the bed, notebooks and journals on the paperwork desk, personalized tools on the working desk, books on the paperwork desk, on and on for what I assume to be an hour, I honestly couldn't tell and didn't know when I started.

With a plop I fell on my bed and placed the pillow on my face. Jackson comforted me by placing his head across my legs.

"Thanks Jackson." I didn't know my mom was on board. That simple fact shut down the amount of fun and simplicity this trip was supposed to have by at least half.

She had a way of doing that.

" _No, no! That's wrong. Again." mom shouted as she watched me do some stretches because my back was sore from sitting in one spot for too long._

 _I was just stretching._

 _I ended up doing the stretches a couple more times before she deemed them good enough._

" _Do mommy a favor and get me some water, would you?" She asked me with a patronizing pat to the head._

" _Okay." At least I got to explore some. It was a few months after being allowed back in the Shield base and my mom had been keeping a tight watch on me._

 _I got the water and was on my way back, when I saw the car. Excitement flooded through me and I couldn't help but grin. I turned to go to the car, but stopped._

 _If mom caught me with the mechanic again she would be really angry. I frowned and got ready to walk back to her, but then a little voice in the back of my mind spoke up._

' _Then don't get caught.' The grin was back full force and I went towards the car. I liked this new voice._

 _The hood was up, but Torin was nowhere to be seen. That dimmed my excitement some, but I started snooping around his workplace, every once and awhile picking something up or poking at something. I had gone all around his workplace and was ready to start poking about the car, when a voice spoke up._

" _Pip? What are you doing." I shot up in surprise and hit my head on the hood of the engine. Rubbing my head I turned towards the voice, relaxing when I saw Torin standing there._

" _Nothin'." Was my totally not suspicious reply. He squinted at me and replied._

" _Your mom doesn't know you're here?" I looked down, I didn't want to lie to Torin, I liked him._

" _No."_

" _Good_ _. Let me show you what I've been working on." I grinned at him as he grinned back, joining me under to hood of his car._


	3. Chapter 3

"Coulson. What a surprise." I said with a bit of fake cheer. I woke up awhile ago from a restless sleep on a hard mattress. Needless to say I wasn't really in the mood.

"Pip, I was wondering if you'd take a look at Lola and make sure nothing's out of order." I perked up quickly. Working on the planes started tomorrow. Today was just a day of paperwork and accumulated broken things from the months I wasn't on board. This would be something fun to do.

And this was Lola we're talking about here. She was the prettiest, and deadliest, car I have ever had the pleasure of working on. Coulson and I bonded over her during my last, and second, trip onto the Hovercraft. It was something we both loved more than we really should.

"Damn right I will!" Coulson let out a friendly smile and began leading me and Jackson, seeing as I didn't want his messing around with everything, to the large garage where Lola was kept. I decided to engage in some small talk, genuinely curious about recent happenings and knowing Coulson was the guy to talk to about gossip.

"So, anything new."

"You heard about Captain America." I grinned, Coulson and I also bonded over an excitement over Captain America. It was cool, plain and simple. First super hero and everything.

"Hell yeah. Is it true he was in the ice?"

"Absolutely. I saw him there, too."

"Did you fangirl?"

"Of course not." He smiled at me. "I'm a professional." I grinned at him. He totally did.

"Anything else?" Coulson sighed getting serious, causing me to frown. Coulson doesn't like to get serious, this must be something big. Now I was worried.

"You know about the Tesseract." I nodded.

"Breaks everything, hard not to know about it."

"Someone's broke into headquarters and taken it." For real?

"Really?" Shield headquarters was the most secure thing I had ever seen. How did someone break in?

"I was there." I frowned deeper. They must have been amazingly strong to take down so many Agents.

"That sucks. Is it a big deal? What does it even do? Besides break stuff." Coulson stopped, leaving me to stop just a bit ahead of him.

"Pip, this is a very big deal." No I was terrified. The thought of working on Lola could barely calm me down.

Jackson whined from in front of me. I agreed.

"What're you guys gonna' do?" He sighed.

"Whatever we can." An easy going smile spread across his face. "Did you hear about Fury's cat experience?" I rolled my eyes at him. That was Coulson.

"Tell me everything." And if he wanted a distraction from whatever the hell was going to happen. I would give it to him.

(*^*)

Lola was as beautiful as ever. Her engine purred and I basically did when I heard her running.

"Oh Coulson. This is art." He smiled.

"I'm afraid I'm going to have to leave you here while I received some very important guests." I rose an eyebrow.

"How important?"

"Very." He sounded almost giddy, though. Taking the edge of his words. I rolled my eyes at him once more.

"Go one then, I'll take good care of her." I said while stroking Lola with my fingertips.

"I know." He left then leaving me with her.

"Just you and me now, Lola." Jackson barked. "And Jackson."

I ended up working on Lola for hours, and even then I only left because some Agent was sent to force me back to the closet.

When I got there I was sad to see an enormous box on my paperwork desk. And ever sadder to see it was full of paperwork.

"What the fuck?" I don't really have much paperwork to do, ever. So why the fuck was there a box full of it sitting on my desk.

But no one argues with Shield when it tells you to do something. So I got started with the ridiculous amount of paperwork and was pleased to see they were nice enough to leave me with a very nice brand of pen I was too poor to buy for myself. I was keeping it.

Getting started I made sure to read everything, twice. I'm not accidentally signing my life over to Shield. It has happened before with younger Agents. I realized it was about health. Basically, Shield wasn't responsible for my death, or the death of anyone on board, and were not to be held responsible for a funeral or taking care of any people in our lives. We normally sign these every 5 years, and once when we join Shield. Why were these issued now?

Now I was really worried. Coulson's worried words, death contracts. The Tesseract really must have been important, and powerful. In the hands of our enemies...I wanted to pee myself.

I didn't, luckily seeing as these were my favorite jeans. I went on reading, rereading, rerereading, and finally tentatively signing. Jackson seemed very concerned with the whole process. Which was nice of him. Misery loves company. So does fear.

An hour or so later the Young Agent showed back up to get the now signed forms.

I made him wait as I took the final sweep through the contracts, sending him over the edge of boredom.

"Does this even sound right?" I ask the wishing-to-be-dead Agent after reading an excerpt from the contract.

"Yes. Yes! Just give them to me!" I shook my finger at him.

"No no no. You have to help me out with this or I'm taking double the time." He practically started crying, before jumping hearing a sound in the lab.

Why was someone in the lab? That was the nicest lab in the entire Hovercraft, no one is allowed to use it. Was it the guest Coulson was talking about, or was it younger agents screwing about?

Either way I had to investigate, and messing with the younger Agent had just become boring. So I handed him the box with a smile.

"All yours!" He seemed very confused, but that was the plan. He would open the door, attracting attention to himself while I could assess the situation from a safe distance.

He slowly took the box, not trusting me but desperately wanting out of the room, and began walking towards the room. With a last look over his shoulder he opened the door with a loud creak.

Attracting the attention of the two people inside.

One very nerdy looking scientist and one very scary looking Agent.

'Oh shit.' Was all I could think. I knew that scary Agent. Black Widow. She isn't the biggest fan of me, or maybe she is. Needless to say she gives very mixed signals and scares me.

Why is she here?

The young Agent rushed out of the room, seeing the Black Widow just as scary as I did, leaving me to the stares of the older people.

I walked to the doorway and stood holding the door open, ready to dart back to safety.

"Wonderful, you're in." I stared wide eyed at the most intimidating show of beauty I had ever seen. "Doctor, this is our mechanic. Anything breaks give it to her." I waved at the Doctor, still scared.

"Hi." He gave me a socially awkward smile and waved back, relaxing me. I could deal with socially awkward, I thrive on socially awkward.

This left us standing around, waiting someone to make the first move. It couldn't be me obviously. Because then I would attract their attention. The attention I already had. My logic didn't have to make sense for my body to follow along.

Eventually I was able to overpower the flawed logic and slowly slip back into the closet, bumping into Jackson on the way in.

Tomorrow needed to hurry up. I needed a break from social situations.

" _Why do you like being a mechanic?" I asked Torin. He smiled up at me from his spot under the car._

" _That's easy. No expectation, besides fix it, and no social communication, besides here's you fixed thing. Nice and simple." I nodded, accepting his wisdom. "What about you?" I looked at his confused. "You've fixed something." He gestured over to a now working radio. "And enjoyed doing it. That means you're a mechanic, basically. So why do you like being a mechanic?"I thought for a few seconds before smiling brightly._

" _It's real simple, no one to please but yourself, and I like making things work." Torin grinned at me._

" _Damn right." He laughed at my beaming smile. "Now do old Torin here a favor and grab that for me."_

 _I stayed with Torin for the rest of the day. And I didn't have to worry about mom catching me because she was stuck in training. It was honestly the highlight of my day getting to see Torin._

 _We listened to some 80s to now station, Torin's favorite, and worked on some random things._

" _You should apply to be my pupil. I'm sure you'd get in." I grinned at Torin, but soon frowned._

" _I don't think my mom would like that." Torin stopped whatever he was doing and looked over to me._

" _Would you?" I paused._

" _Yeah, I would. I want you to be my mentor." I looked at him._

" _Then that's something worth fighting for. Sometimes you gotta' fight for things you want. Don't wait for others to decide for you." Torin looked at me proudly making me feel proud of myself. Mom doesn't look at me like that all to often._

" _Fight for yourself, Pip. Fight._ "


	4. Chapter 4

When tomorrow finally arrived I could barely contain my excitement. Planes are cool, I couldn't wait to get to work.

Jackson didn't feel the same way. He stayed laying on the bed tiredly as I got up and started collecting my thing.

The toolboxes, snacks and water, special new parts, earbuds and my phone, radio, on and on into my brown backpack.

I got dressed last, seeing as I really liked my pajamas. I got into the jeans from yesterday, only a few grease stains marked them and they really didn't smell that bad, and a new shirt advertising some cereal, because my old one did smell that bad.

"Alright Jackson, let's go." I couldn't leave Jackson in here the entire day, so he was coming with me as company. I get lonely sometimes, truth be told. It's like little burst of 'you're all alone working on some engine you fucking loser'. And believe it or not, I'm not a huge fan of those little burst. Jackson helped keep them away.

I clipped on his brown leash and off we went. Back through the hundreds of hallways, pass the thousands of rooms, and not daring to look at the things that probably shouldn't exist. Before arriving back up top on the run ways of the Hovercraft. It's landing area is a lot nicer than the one back at my normal Shield base. Lots more planes.

Every plane in the back left corner needed work, a system I had worked out a while ago, so I went to the back left corner and was surprised to see something near 50 planes.

What the fuck happened?

Normally there were only 5 to 10. But 50? It must have been the Tesseract. It was the only explanation my mind could come up with. It had been breaking everything else, it could probably break planes to. Right?

But it's not my place to question a lot, so I went to the first plane and began examining the damage.

(*^*)

It took me till lunch to do about half of the planes, seeing as most of them were unfixable or very simply fixed, but now I had the rest of the day to go.

I was sitting in a plane, somewhere in the back of the row just by the air conditioning pretending to work while I ate my lunch and got Jackson his. I had already fixed this plane and set the sign out declaring it 'fixed', but no one really cared enough to check.

I had my radio blaring the 80s to now station, my favorite, as I hummed along. That sandwich was straight up disgusting. But I was hungry so I ate it while grimacing at every bite. Basically describing public school lunch, something that has been with me for a great many years.

I heard some clamoring outside the plane, but ignored it in favor of grinning at a Katy Perry song.

It wasn't like I was some huge fan, but they were catchy and easy to sing along to, and it was early Katy Perry. I kissed a girl played loudly as I laughed in memory of singing along when I was younger.

Then the clamoring grew closer. I frowned as I turned off the Katy Perry song and shushed Jackson's loud munching with a pat to his side and a loud 'shut the hell up'.

It was someone running, that much I could tell. Wait, two people running? It could have been a group of marathon runners for all I knew. I'm not very good at this.

I frowned deeper as I took another bite of my cringe worthy sandwich. I shouldn't make my own food anymore. I'm not very good at it.

I started debating this and ignoring the clamoring growing closer until the door to the plane burst open and two people came running in. I jumped up, freaking out.

"What the fuck!?" The driver turned towards me. Black Widow. It would be. Then the passenger. Captain America, Just my luck. I'd have to tell Coulson later. He'd be so jealous. Captain turned towards Widow.

"It's some kid. We have to drop her off." She shook her head, much to my confusion and fear. Why are we taking off?

"No time." Was all she said.

"Are you sure? I can just jump out." I offered. I don't wanna' be on this plane right now. I really shouldn't be on this plane right now. That much I could tell.

Jackson obviously agreed with me, whining loudly.

"Not possible." She shut my idea down quickly.

"I think I could!" I yelled back. But it was futile, we were in the air and speeding towards some random place. Well, random for me. I'm sure they knew exactly where they were going.

"Too late kid, sorry." Captain spoke up sounding surprisingly earnest, sitting down on the seat closest to my position on the floor.

"You sure?" He looked at me seriously.

"Positive." Alright, not one to joke around. I'll tell Coulson that. He'll appreciate that knowledge. Though he's probably already figured that out.

And then we were sitting awkwardly. I took another bite of my sandwich, hating the taste but loving the distraction, and put a hand on Jackson hoping to calm him down.

Jackson doesn't do planes very well, especially the speeding out of control kind of planes. I don't think anyone likes planes when Black Widow drives. And I just fixed with one too. You know, this is probably why there were so many planes to fix.

"I'm Steve Rogers, pleasure to meet you." I looked up at him awkwardly. Thankful he took the initiative, but wondering what he actually thought that would accomplish. None the less I politely replied.

"Pip. Same." Yeah, Pip. Just say same. That'll make the world's first superhero think you're cool. Same...dumbass.

We settled back into an uncomfortable silence. I wanted to know where we were going, but didn't want to break the silence I managed to create.

I cursed myself the entire ride, which really didn't take that long.

At some point we stopped, or at least slowed down, and listened to the drama going down below us. Although, I wasn't really listening. Who the fuck says same anyway?

All the sudden the hatch opened up and the wind started blowing my short hair in every direction. I then realized I probably should have been listening at that moment.

"What?" I whispered under my breath. I happen to be saying that a lot, it seems. What was I even doing here?

Then I see Captain America, costume and all, jump the fuck out of the plane landing in the crowd below.

"What the actual hell?" I asked Jackson. He probably knew more than I did at that point.

When he didn't answer I turned to Black Widow. She was focused on what was happening below us. I then realized she had a great view of what was going on.

I stood up, shaky in my legs and my mind, and walked over to her and sat in the co pilots seat. She only glanced at me, really not caring why I was here. Jackson walked up to me and sat in front of my chair.

And through the window I saw it all. Captain America shielding some old guy from some ridiculously dressed guy in the middle of the crowd.

I don't do very well in high stress situations.

I want to go back home.

" _No."_

" _Mom, listen to me. I want to do this. I'm good at this! I suck at being a field Agent and you know it's true!"_

" _Absolutely not."_

" _This is bull shit!" She looked angrily at me._

" _You will not mentor under some mechanic!"_

" _Why! It's not your life, it's mine. I want to do this so I will. There is nothing left to say."_

" _I will not have you soil my legacy!" I stopped and looked at her in disbelief._

" _Your legacy? That's all you care about?" My eyes widened and I scoffed. "That's seriously all you care about."_

" _No it's n-"_

" _Well I don't. Your legacy can crash and burn and fuck off to who the hell cares. Because I don't fucking care."_

" _How dare you." I turned to leave. "You look at me!" I continued to walk away, headed towards my safe haven to hand in my official mentor papers. "Right now!"_

 _I stopped and turned back. My right hand rose and formed a single finger. She gasped and began screaming again. Mom wasn't a fan of curse words or inappropriate gestures, but I felt that it summed up my feelings pretty well._

 _I seemed strong, but halfway there the tears started and they just wouldn't stop. I started sobbing as I ran towards Torin._

" _Pip?" I crashed into him, holding on for dear life. "Oh, Pip." He wrapped his arms around me, holding me safe._

" _It'll be okay_ _._ "


	5. Chapter 5

Captain America spoke first, strong with the ideals of freedom.

"Last time I was in Germany," Germany! We're in Germany! At least I knew that. Why weren't people speaking German, then? And I missed the rest of what he was saying. It didn't seem to matter, though, as they began to fight. Throwing punches and kicks back and forth.

I couldn't help but be surprised, and a bit disappointed, when Steve got knocked away. He's got to be better than that, right?

Then Black Widow spoke firmly.

"Drop the scepter." It was broadcasted down to the crowd, attracting the strange man's attention. He looked up at us and began to raise the scepter.

'Oh, shit. Oh, shit. He's not dropping it. That's the opposite of dropping it!' My thoughts were a tornado of panic. And then he shot at us.

Black Widow expertly maneuvered us out of the way, causing me to hit my head on the back of my seat. My surprisingly hard seat.

I grumbled a bit while rubbing the back of my head, an old habit picked up from my mentor.

We were doomed. I should've just died this morning. Then none of this would have happened. Well, it would've, but I wouldn't have had to be here for it.

Then AC DC began blaring through the speakers. was a little weirded out, I didn't know Black Widow was a fan, it honestly seemed a little out of character.

"Sorry I'm late." Was that Iron Man? That's more in character. He honestly seemed the type. What was Iron Man doing here? In Germany? And I missed the rest of what he was saying.

"Good choice." Did that guy just give up? What did I miss?

(*^*)

Next thing I know Captain, Iron Man, and the strange guy walked on board.

"Glad you could make it." That was Black Widow, speaking to Iron Man. he walked, more like swaggered, around.

"Well, someone needed to save the day." She rolled her eyes, then focused on the strange guy, I'm not positive it's a guy anymore. If it was he had really fabulous hair. I'm a little jealous.

"And even more glad you could join us." She said, sarcasm dripping off her words.

He ignored her in favor of sitting down and smirking mysteriously. That was creepy as fuck. Who the hell was this guy?

Unfortunately, Iron man decided to focus in on the 'co pilot' next, or at least the person in the co pilot's seat. Me.

"They're starting you Agents off pretty young, hmm?" I grimaced and answered truthfully.

"I'm not supposed to be here. I don't even want to be here." He looked confused, but went with it.

The ride was awkwardly silent, until Captain America started 'whispering' to Iron Man, he's not that great at whispering.

"He just gave up so quickly." Did he? Did Iron Man not give him a reason to give up in the rest of whatever it was he had to say? And I missed the rest of their conversation, but at least I managed to catch the start of a new one.

"What's wrong, scared of a little lightning?" Iron Man mocked. It was storming outside, when did that happen? The weird guy grimaced, scaring me. If that guy was scared, so was I.

"I'm not overly fond of what follows." I squinted at him.

"Thunder?" He rolled his eyes at me, then lightning struck the plane. jackson let out a loud whine as I held onto him and the seat. Is this what's been breaking all the planes? I don't know what to believe anymore. The hatch then broke open. I was going to have to fix that.

And there's another strange guy in the plane, this one was definitely a guy, but his hair was still really fabulous. What the fuck? I think it's gonna' be my new motto.

I'm never having lunch inside a plane again.

Jackson barked at him, but the man ignored him and grabbed the first weird guy before jumping out of the fucking plane.

Why? I don't even know what to question anymore. Just, why?

Iron Man jumped after them, for some reason wanting to keep them on board.

And then Captain America grabbed a parachute. Black Widow spoke up, obviously concerned for his safety.

"You might want to stay out of this one, Captain. These guys are practically Gods." Gods? I feel like I'm missing something here. Do the rest of them know who those guys were. Probably.

"There's only one God, ma'am. And I'm pretty sure he doesn't dress like that." I fucking hope not, but what? Is that your argument? Fr jumping out of a plane into a battle of the 'Gods'?

And out of the god damned plane he went.

Maybe I'll play it safe and never eat lunch again.

Black Widow drew my attention, pressing buttons and announcing things. I couldn't see the fight below, seeing as I'm near sighted and without my glasses, but I'd bet quite a bit that she could.

What the fuck.

(*^*)

Pretty soon two strange men, Captain America, Iron Man, and Black Widow were on board with me and Jackson, who wasn't having any of this shit and decided to go to sleep.

I was feeling quite a bit out of place in the awkward silence.

What were they trying to do anyway?

Why strange guy number one?

What was this about?

Then it hit me. The fucking Tesseract. That stupid piece of shit hates me. It's doing this to spite me. Breaking fucking everything wasn't enough, apparently.

What even was the Tesseract?

Was is alive?

Was it able to do things out of spite?

Probably.

So here I am feeling out of place, overwhelmed, and wanting to cry.

I shouldn't even be here.

" _I shouldn't have done this. It was a mistake." Torin looked at me saddly._

" _You can't just give up every time something doesn't go your way." I looked at him challengingly._

" _Watch me." He smiled._

" _Come on, let's try again. We can do it this time."_

" _No we can't. That stupid radio hates me."_

" _You think everything hates you."_

" _Everything does!" I exclaimed._

" _No they don't. Now come on. What do we do first."_

 _We worked on it for hours. Over and over, trying everything we could, learning about every single part of that damn radio._

 _I started to cry._

" _That's it, I can't." I sobbed out. Torin sighed, but embraced me filling me with a feeling of safety and security._

" _Yes you can. Again." I looked at him, feeling miserable._

 _But I did it again._

 _And when I finally heard that sweet Katy Perry song burst to life, I cried again. I'll never love another song the way I loved I kissed a girl at that exact moment._

" _What! Come on you did it. Why are you crying!" Torin joked._

" _Tears of joy you dick." He laughed and I soon joined in, grabbing a tissue for my puffy red eyes. "I hate that radio."_

" _You'll learn to love it and it's strange ways." Torin answered simply._

" _No, I don't think so."_

" _That's what I said." I looked at him, grinning for the first time in hours._

 _When it finally became time to leave, Torin stopped me at the door with a few words._

" _What'd you learn today?" I turned to him, confused. He was there, right? "Just tell me, come on." I sighed._

" _How to fix a radio."_

" _Wrong." I looked even more confused. Torin stood and walked over to me, grabbing my shoulders with a small smile._

" _You learned that you can do anything if you set your mind to it."_

" _Anything?" I mocked jokingly. He answered seriously._

" _Anything, Pip._ "


	6. Chapter 6

Landing was just as awkward and tense as the rest of the flight, but I managed not to cry during that, so I could manage not to do it again. Hopefully. Maybe I would finally end up peeing myself. Please don't, body.

Agents surrounded Jackson and I as we tried to sneak off and get out of this mess. Which actually helped us blend in and get out.

Unfortunately, they we're going the same direction as I was. So I followed along hidden inside the crowd, wishing the sandwich would have been worth this trouble.

Finally they split from the path I took to the closet. My entire body relaxed and I started running through the halls as Jackson dashed behind me. Agents yelled at me, but this time I didn't care. I just want to go back to my space where I can think and no one cares.

Pushing open the door to the lab I heard the Doctor watching some video.

"Well, let me know if true power wants a magazine." The video stopped when I walked in. The Doctor turned to look at me.

"Oh, Pip, hey."

"Hey, Doctor."

"Bruce, is fine."

"Cool." Cue seconds of standing around aimlessly. "Alright, then." I said as I began walking towards the closet once again.

Bruce got back to some hologram or video or whatever the fuck it was as I rushed into my office.

When the door finally creaked shut, I let out a relieved sigh. At least I was away from the superheros and villains and everyone else. Just me, Jackson, and the tools.

So I got to work doing what I do best. I couldn't go out and finish up the rest of the planes now, obviously. So I worked on some of the random stuff people had dropped off.

I wanted to do the lab stuff first, as I had to give it my full attention and wouldn't be able to think about today, so I dived into the largest box and started organizing. Funnily enough, Bruce had left something.

He must have done it when I was out, and pretty early too because it was near the bottom of the box. But it was top priority for me.

I had no clue what this thing was or where to begin. It was literally a silver square. What could it possibly do.

I messed with it for a while. Waving my hand around it, throwing it about, doing everything I could think of before setting it down tiredly.

Next option.

I went to my old, very slow laptop and began researching. I suck at researching, I just don't have the skills needed to be successful at it. And I hate doing it. But I also realize this is my second to last option. And I rather not bother Bruce, or leave the closet, if I had the choice.

I couldn't find anything. To be fair I wasn't trying that hard, but I doubt I would have anyway. It was Shield, which probably meant it technically didn't exist.

So I really only had one option left. I had to ask Bruce.

I went up to my creaky door and opened at, cringing at the loud sound.

"Hey, Doctor? What is thi...s." Everyone was in there. Captain America, Black Widow, Iron Man, strange guy number two, and Director Fury. Fuck.

And cue the tense few seconds of silence. But don't worry, Iron Man is here to save the day.

"Hey, kid from the plane!" Fury glared at me.

"Why were you on that plane." He stated more than asked. Definitely should have died this morning.

"The real question is, why were they?" I slowly and unconvincingly got out. I can weasel out of this, I'm great at weaseling out of thing. "I was just doing my job. It was in the broken lot, I was working on it when they barged in." He stared at me, unbelieving. "I offered to jump out!"

"With all due respect, Director. The kid is hardly the problem." God bless you Steve. God bless your star spangled ass and it's wonderful, albeit mysterious, ways.

They all started arguing again, leaving me to slip back into the office. But I paused outside the door.

I really wanted to know what they were saying. Did it concern me? No. Was I going to listen? Yes. So what was I going to do?

I crouched down on the door and looked under the crack. I still couldn't hear anything.

Jackson came up to me then, licking my face and causing me to fall with a small 'thump'.

"Damn it Jackson. Stop." I whispered while rubbing my face, feeling bad when he whined and laid down by me. "Just." I sighed. "Just don't be loud." He didn't reply, though I didn't really expect him to, but looked satisfied with our agreement.

Leaving me to look under the crack once more, but it still didn't work all that well. I could see feet and hear mumbles, but that wasn't enough to satisfy my curiosity.

So I took a risk. I'm not a huge fan of risks, or stepping outside of the norm, or doing anything to attract attention from myself. This was kind of a big deal for me, and I got to eavesdrop on superheros. That's more than a lot of people can say. Coulson probably could. Damn it.

With, luckily, no creak I cracked open my door just in time to see everyone, but Bruce, Iron Man, and Captain America leaving and Steve began talking, again. He really did talk a lot didn't he?

"Do you think he's telling the truth?" Who? Strange guy number one?

"Well. We'll know when Jarvis breaks into Shield's files." Not strange guy number one. Shield's files? Were they going after an Agent? That's pretty serious.

"That's not right."

"Come one Capsicle." That was actually pretty good. "You trust Fury? The leader of all spies? The best one there is?" Wait, are they going after Fury? Holy shit.

"More than I do you, right now." Iron Man scoffed.

"Come one. Doctor, back me up on this!" Steve and Iron Man looked at Bruce, expectantly. I wouldn't want to be him right now.

"Well. It was something Loki said." Wait a second. Who's Loki? That's a really strange name. Oh, strange. One of the strange guys! I should be a detective. I think I would be amazing. "A bright light for all of humankind to share." That is something I would remember a strange guy saying. And I missed the rest of what he was saying. This is what I get for trying to be funny.

"I'm out." And Captain America makes a sassy exit.

I think that's all I'd like to know.

So with an extreme amount of finesse and skill, I slowly close the door. Only for it to creak and attract the attention of Iron man and Bruce, the only two left in the lab.

I like Bruce, and Iron Man some small amount, but I don't think I can trust them not to kill me right now.

" _Why would I keep a journal? That're really lame." Torin faked offense and scoffed._

" _Well maybe you're lame."_

" _Is that so?"_

" _It would happen to be, yes." I purse my lips and squint at him, before grinning._

" _Dick." He grins back._

" _Bitch." I laugh at him and he at me before we quiet down and get back to work._

 _That dumb fucking radio broke again. And guess who Torin wants to fix it. That's right. Me. A comfortable silence formed, before Torin broke it._

" _You really should keep a journal, though." I glanced at him curiously. It must be important to him._

" _Why?'" He smiled at me, glad to have my interest._

" _Well. Proof, for one thing." I couldn't help but raise my eyebrow at him. Proof?_

" _For what?"_

" _If Shield ever decides to cross you, or any of it's Agents for that matter." Now I'm worried._

" _Would Shield do that?" He looked at me seriously._

" _They give out contracts every once and awhile. Sometimes they try to get you to sign your life away." My eyes widened in horror. "Always read the contracts. And keep a log of everything you do for Shield. That way you have something."_

" _How will that keep me alive?"_

" _It won't." He admitted. "But, you could give it to someone or tell someone where it is in case you die. Then Shield's secrets are out in the open."_

" _Still won't bring me back to life."_

" _But it will avenge you!" I laughed a bit before getting more serious again._

" _Okay. I'll start doing that." Torin looked thankful, before getting giddy. "What?"_

" _I hoped you'd say that, because I have something for you." He pulled out a rectangular present wrapped in newspaper. I grinned, getting excited. Torin's presents are always really thoughtful and awesome._

 _I ripped into it, stopping to smile at a brown leather journal with 'Pip' engraved in the front._

" _Thanks Torin. Really." I got teary._

" _It matches the one my mentor got me." He pulled out a similar brown leather journal with 'Torin' engraved in the front. We grinned at each other._

 _Torin spent a while teaching me a good way to log my days before we both got back to work._

 _I let out a sigh._

" _What's up?"_

" _I just kind of feel like it's really paranoid."_

" _What is?"_

" _The journal. I feel like I should have some trust." Torin stood and walked over to me and placed a hand on my hand, ruffling my hair._

" _Your trust is important, Pip. Don't waste it on those not worth it._ " _I smiled up at him._

" _I trust you, Torin." He smiled down at me._

" _And I trust you, Pip."_


	7. Chapter 7

"Whatcha' doin' kid?" Iron Man asked me, looking at me kneeling on the floor.

"You know, stuff." I replied, looking a tad suspicious. I'm not gonna' let this ruin me. "How'd the meeting go? Fun stuff all around?" A moment of silence passed. Alright, that's a dead end. Hopefully nothing like the end of this encounter. What could I possibly say? I felt the smooth grey box against my hand. Got it. "Doctor, about earlier. What is this?" I asked, standing up and showing him the box. He squinted behind his glasses, trying to get a good look, before looking embarrassed.

"That's why I put it in the box. I have no clue." Iron Man cut in then.

"That's Stark stuff from the many himself." He pointed at himself. "Give it here." I walked up to him and handed it to him, but was really confused.

"The many himself?" He looked at me, amused.

"Me."I rose a brow. "Tony Stark." I paused, wasn't that Iron Man? Then it hit me.

They were the same person! He came out as Iron Man awhile ago, didn't he? Everyone freaked out because he was this really stuck up, pretentious guy who now wanted to be a superhero. I forgot about that.

"Oh, yeah. From Stark Industries, or something like that."

"The one and only. And this," He held up the box. "Is a, very simple, modelizer." All I could do was stare confused. "It models things to big or dangerous to do normally."

"Oh. That's cool. How's it work?"

"Simply." He held it in his let hand while pushing underneath it with his right on. Projections or holograms or whatever they were pushed up from the box and spread around the room. Volcanoes, missions to faraway planets, everything you could imagine as long as it was big and scary. "These are just the prototypes, simple models we've been using for awhile, so eventually you'll be able to program in your own."

This was, amazing. A grin erupted on my face as I saw the solar system, volcanoes, things I used to learn in school. This was,

"Awesome." Stark looked pleased before shutting it down with the same hand motion he used before.

"Thanks." He handed it to me and turned away. "Now if we could find out what to do with this." He stood in front of a scepter, the one that strange guy had before.

"Is that like the Tesseract?" It gave of the same feeling all the stuff the Tesseract broke before. Tony and Bruce looked concerned.

"What would you know about that?" Bruce said. So the Tesseract really was a big deal. Superheros and Agents worried about it all at the same time, that's not a very good thing.

"I fix things around Shield. I'm the mechanic. Just so happens the Tesseract breaks everything." They looked relieved. Tony spoke up next.

"Sorry kid, Pip? Was it?" At my nod he continued. "Looks Like this one breaks everything, too." I grimaced, but accepted the fact that anything Shield was involved in broke everything.

The conversation was probably over, but I then realized I should milk this for all it's got.

"Hey, Tony, and Bruce. Would you mind looking at some other things and telling me what they're about?" He nodded, pleased to be of service.

So I ran back into my office and came back with the box of science stuff. There was a lot of stuff.

(*^*)

It took Tony and Bruce only a short while to explain everything to me. They would have been great co teachers.

Now I sat out on the lab, on the side closest to my office, on a desk working on things while randomly shouting out questions. These guys were actually pretty cool.

At some point I brought my radio out, blasting the same station as always why humming along. I had patched it up the night before, so no troubles on that front. The Science Bros, as they prefered to be called, didn't mind the noise. I really appreciated that because I find it hard to work without it.

Currently I was working on some dumb looking gun, all we really need is a barrel and a trigger guys, while humming along to Xs and Os, a newer song that I found myself really enjoying.

And then Fury and Black Widow walked in. Well, more like barged in. Luckily Fury didn't seem to care about me all too much and began yelling at Tony.

"Why is your system trying to hack Shield?" My eyes widened. Not good. Then a notification popped up on Tony's screen. Oh shit.

"Trying to? More like did." Fury was angry now. Should I run? No, that'll attract his attention. Treat him like a T-Rex. "What's stage 2?" Maybe we don't have to know.

Now Steve burst in, and somewhere in between strange guy number two, who I still didn't really know about, slipped in.

"Shield makes weapons with the Tesseract." Yeah, they probably would. He slammed a giant gun thing down on the table. Oh, with the stage 2! With the Tesseract? That's probably really dangerous. And it would be able to break even more stuff.

"Explain that." Tony said, technically winning the argument. Fury looked furious, ironically enough, and pointed to strange guy number two.

"Because of him!" What'd that guy do? Besides wear a ridiculous red cape.

"My people have no trouble with your planet!" Was this guy an alien? Oh fuck.

"But other planets might. We have to be prepared." That makes logical sense.

"Doctor, you might want to remove yourself from this argument." Black Widow, are Agent Romanoff, spoke up.

"Why? So I don't Hulk out?"Was this guy the Hulk? What the fuck did I miss?

And then began the argument of the century. I could only pick out a few sentences, but that was plenty for me.

"You people are so petty. And small." Compared to you, fucking behemoth, yeah.

Then the Doctor got loud. Please don't.

"You want to see my party trick?" He was holding the scepter. Why was he holding the scepter. Everyone seemed very cautious, and not very happy, with him holding it.

"Put it down, Banner." Were his initials B.B, 'cause that's adorable.

The most terrifying thing was that Bruce seemed concerned that he was holding it, like he didn't realize he picked it up.

The computer dinged again. He put it down, relaxing everyone.

"Sorry guys, guess you don't get to see my party trick after all." I don't want to go to that party. "The Tesseract, it's," They were looking for the Tesseract? What the actual fuck? "...here."

Mother fucking shit.

 **Boom**. An explosion went off, shaking the lab and throwing everyone around. My ears rang, my eyes stung, my entire body hurt.

Then I looked up.

I was with Bruce and Agent Romanoff. She was trapped under a pillar, or something and trying to get it off. I went to stand up and help her, as much as I could, but stopped.

Bruce was mildly green.

"Calm down, ." My eyes widened in fear. Fucking shit.

 _My eyes widened in fear. Fucking shit._

 _A dog stood in front of me. Dark brown fur, dark brown eyes, sharp teeth. It growled whenever I moved and followed me closely with its eyes._

 _I shouldn't have taken the alleyway home. But it was late and I was late and I wanted to get home quickly._

 _Now I'm gonna' die._

 _Unless I could give it something? Like a peace offering!_

 _I reached slowly into my pocket, stopping as he growled._

" _It, it's food. Promise. You hungry boy?" I don't get to interact with dogs all that much, mom doesn't like them, besides hanging with my grandma's. And they were the sweetest dogs ever in the history of dogs._

 _This one was not._

 _None the less, I made it into my pocket and got out, thankfully convenient, packet of beef jerky. One that I would be sad to see let go. I like my beef jerky, and I don't get to eat much of it, mom doesn't like it. Throwing one out with a simple,_

" _Here you go, boy." I was glad to see it stop it's growling and accept it with a hungry snap. It was really hungry._

 _And so began feeding the dog my entire pack of jerky._

 _Eventually we were sitting side by side watching the birds fly over._

" _You know boy, you're a really good dog." I said raising a hand to his head and slowly giving him a comforting stroke. "In fact, you remind me of a friend of mine." A friend of mine, also known as someone I sort of know. "Jackson. A pretty rude kid, but only because he's scared of everything."_

" _You're not mean, you're just scared._ " _I smiled at his when he whined. "You know what I'll call you. Jackson." A mighty bark roared from him, startling me. "That good, huh?" I look up at the setting sun. Setting? Oh no. I stood up and started to walk away. "I'll see you tomorrow Jackson. I promise!" Another bark, making me trip and struggle to stand again. That was terrifying._

 _And so began the adventures of a girl and her dog._


	8. Chapter 8

Why was Bruce going green? I mean, I know why, but why now? When I'm around?

"Calm down Bruce!" Agent Romanoff tries to yell at the quickly changing Bruce while struggling to get her leg out from under the pillar sort thing.

But I don't think Bruce was there any more. Hulk let out a roar and got ready to go at Agent Romanoff.

I have to help.

"Hulk! Relax man! It's just us. Chill!" He turned towards me and roared, just as Agent Romanoff freed herself. She got ready to run, but looked back at me frozen in fear. "Go." I whispered. She was more important.

She looked conflicted, but decided to go and give a dead girl her last wish.

"Alright, . I think we all need to calm down." I said, raising my hands as he stepped closer.

Hulk looked at me with the creepiest eyes I've ever seen, before turning and running towards the Black Widow. Was I not important enough? I mean I'm relieved for myself, but kind of insulted.

Agent Romanoff!

I began running after them, finding an amazingly difficult obstacle course to follow. Pipes jutting out of the walls, hot smoke blocking my way, things thrown randomly about, and, my favorite, a single pebble placed in the center of the path. Which I tripped, and fell very loudly, on.

I finally get to where they are to see Agent Romanoff jumping into some hidden passageway thing and Hulk prepare to jump after her.

"Hulk. Stop!" He turned toward me with angry, more like annoyed, eyes. But he didn't get to stare at me for long.

A hammer, a gigantic alien looking hammer, burst out of nowhere. Smacking Hulk in the face before finding its resting spot in strange guy number two's hands.

What the fuck?

Who fights with a hammer anyway? I mean, thanks and that's pretty cool, but a hammer?

And then begins the smackdown.

Punches and hammers were thrown while I tried my very hardest not to get involved. I'm not sure if you can tell, but I'm not the most athletic or strong in just about every room I'm in.

Eventually I was blocked into a corner while covering my head with my hands. It was a very nice corner, though. Traditional Shield grey and all the normal jazz of Shield. So no jazz, obviously.

Somehow I ended up alone with Hulk in a room with some wall missing. With his attention totally, and laser, focused on me.

Luckily, or unluckily if you're a fan of cool planes with big guns, something got his attention. A cool plane with big guns, believe it or not. And I understand how hard that could be to believe, especially since Shield's involved. Sarcasm.

I try to hide behind Hulk, hoping not to seem like a threat to the pilot of those very big guns, but I don't seem to be too important to the pilot. Hulk, he's focused on Hulk.

And he starts shooting.

"Ahh! Stop! Please!" He doesn't seem to care. In fact, he cares just about as much as Hulk cared about him. Who was swatting away bullets like flies.

So, once again, I was using Hulk as a Shield. But this time I was on his back holding onto his shoulders for my life. He cared about me as much as he cared about the bullets, not at all. Which was good for me, he could easily take me down.

Until it very obviously wasn't.

Hulk jumped the, admittedly small for a beast like him, gap onto the plane. With me on his shoulders. This hasn't been the very best day.

While he began ripping the plane apart, seemingly powered on by the screams the pilot sang out, I began hyperventilating.

I screamed as Hulk refused to let the pilot go to safety, and cried when he finally released him.

"Hulk! Pleas-" I was interrupted by my own sob. I held on tighter while I cried and the wind ripped the tears from my face.

Hulk looked back at me as the plane spiralled down, noticing me now. I guess I should count myself luckily when he went back to his task of destroying the quickly falling plane.

The monster even felt bad for me.

Who was I kidding. **I** felt bad for me.

Then the big bad ground showed up. I guess I should have known it was coming, as it always seems to, but I had a lot of things on my mind.

Hulk began twisting around so his back faced the ground. I faced the ground. Shit.

"Hulk! Please help!" I sobbed wildly.

He grunted and grabbed me of my back. The wind stung my eyes and my hair flew around without a purpose. I let out a scream as I got very dizzy.

It didn't last for too long, though. I eventually found myself in the Hulk's strong grasp. Protected from the wind and the quickly approaching ground.

In a monster hug.

I'm not complaining, however it may seem. That was really thoughtful of Hulk. To protect the frail human from the ground.

When we impacted I felt the air rush out of me and my body curl inwards. It was only for a few seconds, but terrifying none the less, that I struggled to breath in. I cried, sorry I meant to say sobbed, for a bit too long before crawling off of Hulk.

That's when the most disturbing process of nature, or the unnatural I guess, happened.

Hulk shrank, turned pale, and bones snapped before they settled on the normal shape of Bruce Banner.

And I cried in relief. I was crying a lot, but I felt it was justified.

When I finally calmed down, I realized he was stark naked. Haha, Stark.

I thanked everything that I had put on a jacket, before taking it off and laying it across his more private parts.

That is something I don't ever want to explain.

When the door to the warehouse, that must be what this was, creaked open I near freaked out. But then a friendly looking many walked in, scared out of his wits.

He noticed me with a start.

"What?"

"Help me."

After explaining more than I really should have and introducing myself to one we sat in a silence.

I'm not great in awkward situations.

" _Just breathe through it. It's honestly not that big of a deal." Torin said in a calming way. Doing nothing to calm my racing nerves._

" _Yeah it is. My mom's gonna' be there and if anything goes wrong she had a reason to cancel the mentorship."_

" _It's a good thing you'll do fine then, right?" I smiled at him, appreciating his relentless calming words. "All you have to do is go up to the stage and read from your script. Simple."_

" _Simple." I repeated._

 _Torin could tell I was freaking out, though. He could always tell, he practically raised me._

" _Have your notecards." I raised the ones in my hands._

" _Check."_

" _Back up cards?" I patted my right pocket._

" _Check."_

" _Go to the bathroom?"_

" _Check."_

" _Then you'll be fine." He held me by the shoulders and looked deeply into my eyes._

" _How do you know?" I said miserably. I don't want to do this._

" _I know you'll do amazing, because you're amazing, Pip. Now go show the world._ "

 _He grinned at me and I couldn't help but do the same._

 _Show time._


	9. Chapter 9

"Hey Bruce." He jumped at the sound of my voice, then grabbed his head. He must have a killer headache from, you know, being the Hulk a while ago. "How ya' doing?" I slurped at the soda I had 'bought' from the closed cafe at the front of the building.

"Pip?" I nodded. I was feeling great. I survived that, I could survive anything. "How did…?"

"Hulk. Very nice guy, apparently." He looked surprised, but thankful. "Now, you got a battle to get to."

It only took a bit to explain the situation to Bruce, and even less to explain the plan I made and show him the motorcycle.

"You're not coming?" I laughed for a good two seconds, before stopping abruptly.

"Come get me when you're done." He looked really understanding, funnily enough, and drove off without another word.

and I watched the motorcycle disappear from sight, then turned to the T.V to watch the battle unfold.

This was going to be awesome, in a scary alien attack kind of way.

(*^*)

It took about a day for Bruce to come get me, maybe longer.

had left as soon as the battle ended, hoping to see his wife and kids still alive back in his small cabin. I thanked him for staying as long as he did, before ushering him out so he wouldn't feel guilty.

I would have loved for him to stay, because I had no phone, wallet, identification, or any way of getting help if Bruce didn't come back, but understood he needed to see his family.

At some point I ended up back in the cafe, eating some sandwich with a bottle of water, before I started raiding the rest of the place.

I found a backpack with some company logo splattered all over it and thankfully grabbed it before continuing on with my quest.

The bathroom was next thankfully, so I got to let out some tension and clean up my tear tracked face.

Then I found an office and borrowed some cash, as well as a some notebooks/notepads and pencils and placed them in my backpack. I looked around the place for a while, hoping not to feel so lonely with all the smiling pictures of the crew and family members, but failing miserably.

The real prize was a small office, next to the one I had raided before, that had comic books. The heros were the same ones that had popped up around New York and everywhere else.

 _The Indestructible Iron Man_

 _The Incredible Hulk_

 _Captain America_

And so on. I decided to take a copy of all of them, keeping out _The Incredible Hulk_ to flip through, seeing as there were tons of each. Who ever it was, some old guy if the photos were right, obviously was hoping to sell these.

I made it back to the cafe and raided the kitchen. Taking the cereal/protein bars, sandwiches, and whatever else wouldn't smush in, or ruin, my backpack. Some water bottles and sodas made it in as well.

And then I waited outside the front of the warehouse. For a guy I had really only just met and owed my life to. And who I desperately needed a ride from.

It was a few snacks and water bottles later that a fancy red car drove up with two heads of dark hair nestled inside.

I was thanking all of creation I had gotten my jacket back, because it was dark and pretty cold, not to mention scary.

"Hey, Pip. Need a ride?" I grinned at Tony's voice.

"Yeah." I hopped in the back seat and turned to Bruce. "Thanks, doctor." He scratched his head and smiled.

"No problem."

The ride back was filled with music and comfortable silence, with the occasional stupid comments from Tony.

It was fun.

(*^*)

When I got dropped off, Tony stopped me with a few words.

"You're good at what you do." I blushed, Stark thought I was good. "Come by the tower some time." I nodded and thanked him. Then watched as the card drove out into the night.

It was time to visit an old friend, and make sure he was alright.

(*^*)

"Torin?" His weathered smile turned mine into a grin.

"Pip." His arms grabbed me into a strong hug. "I missed you."

"Me too." I felt happy in his embrace, the smell of cigarettes and whiskey pouring off of him. He was enjoying retirement.

We talked for hours. About nothing, about everything, about all in between. Comparing journals and making spaghetti, it didn't matter what we did.

I was with Torin, and that made me happy.

"Stark said you're good." I grinned at his proud voice.

"I learned from the best." He laughed, a strong a loud sound.

"Damn right." He looked at me seriously. "I did too."

"Your mentor?" I was confused. He shook his head with a grin.

"You." I looked at his surprised.

"Me?" He nodded.

" _You taught me more than you'll ever know_ _._ " I looked up at him, misty eyed.

"Same."

"Now let's get back Stark." I laughed loudly, happy to be reunited with the only person I've ever felt at home with.

i was feeling great, happy for the first time in a while.

Things are going to change. Are going to better. I'm not gonna' be Shield's slave anymore.

Things are looking up.

-(~^~)-

Author's Note!- I'd like to thank you all for reading my second ever Avenger's fanfiction _THE MECHANIC._ It was fun to write, and it'll be fun to see your reactions.

That's right, I wrote all of this before posting the first chapter. Because I don't like the feeling of waiting for a new chapter and I figured you wouldn't either.

Tell me everything.

Did you like it? Did you hate it? Did you like Pip's character? Did the canon character seem OOC? Was it too short? Was it too long? Do you want a second book? Too many commas?

Tell me everything and anything, I honestly want to know.

I will assume favorites and follows mean you want a second book, and if I get enough of those, I'll post another chapter here, telling you to go check out the new, second, book!

 _ **TO THE CONFUSED GUEST - she is 10 - 18 in flashbacks(italics) and 20 during the story(normal text)**_

Thanks for everything, Kiki.


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